Hi All,

It has been quite a while since our last posting. We are now (5 Apr) in Kathmandu since 1 April. The weather is still quite cold despite winter already ended last month.

Kathmandu is a very busy city with movements everywhere – cars, motorcycles, rickshaws, bicycles and people moving in all directions, left right, front back, top & below, just like an army of ants marching. The honking of cars, buses, lorries, motorcycles and even bicycles is another issue of concern, so you need to have ear plugs to keep you sane. You also need a face mask to keep the dust out of the nose and mouth. If you have mastered ‘tai-chi’ then you could move easier on the streets because you can manoeuvre your way in between motorcycles, cars, rickshaws and bicycles easily. Hmmmm, ear plugs face mask and tai-chi, yeah what a combination !!!

Nepal people are very accommodating, helpful, humble and tolerant. We have a lot of respect for them. The majority are poor but despite the hardships they are facing in life, they are very hardworking and happy.

There are many hotels in Kathmandu and the room rates are as low as USD15 per night with plenty of choices. Within the 5 days in Kathmandu, we have stayed in 3 different hotels because the 1st one is a bit expensive, the 2nd hotel exercise their own way of supplying electricity, water and internet for their hotel’s customers and the 3rd one so far seems okay as we did not encounter any issue and they give us free breakfast unlike the first 2 though this 3rd hotel is cheaper. Move to a 4th hotel…… we are not sure yet ! So if you have the time and you are a bit resourceful, you can get quite a good bargain for hotels in Kathmandu.

The power supply in Nepal is under government control and will come on and off according to the time schedule. Hotels too are not exempted. Most hotels have generators to do their in-house power supply. So your time management capabilities must be good so that you can timely charge your phone, lap top, camera etc. Don’t worry after a few days in Kathmandu you will get used to it.

Our bike, the Black V is arriving Kathmandu on Sunday, 6 April and we are taking it out from the airport on Monday, 7 April. Black V has given us some drama and almost did not make it to Kathmandu. It was supposed to arrive in Kathmandu on 2 April but it didn’t. The forwarding agent that we entrusted to send the bike suddenly decided to increase the price by 250% from the original price at the very last hour. After a few days of ding & dong and ping & pong with our lawyer posting a letter right to their office door, they eventually agreed to send the bike. However, all these ding dong ping pong has cost us some extra money which we did not plan for.

So if anyone is planning to ship/airfreight out his bike from Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia our advice is not to use this agent. You can contact us personally (zainal-b@hotmail.com) to check whether the agent you are engaging is the same one we had encountered. If you still decide to engage this agent, you should engage a lawyer as well, just in case.

We are heading to Pokhara, about 215 km west of Kathmandu next Tuesday, 8 April or Wednesday, 9 April. We plan to do a short mountain hiking over there. Meanwhile Celeste (the Trailing Spouse) has found something to do in Kathmandu. She is giving dance lessons to students at a local college. I am yet to find anything to do (or should I), so while Celeste is busy with her students, I will continue to walk around the city with my ear plugs, face mask and further practise my tai-chi skills because we still have more than a week to go in Nepal.

In terms of providing like/love rating levels for Kathmandu, our rating so far is 8/10. We love the people’s enthusiasm, hospitality, the weather, the good food the cheap hotels and of course, The Trailing Spouse is loving the shopping and I have to keep reminding her “panniers…not suitcase” otherwise I’ll have to get a side car just for the luggage.

Cheers,
Borneoman & Trailing Spouse On 2 Wheels

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More pictures in Kathmandu Nepal to share.

Cheers,

Borneoman & Trailing Spouse on 2 Wheels

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Thanks Bro for the update. Looking forward for more postings.
Take care.
Regards.
Rajen

Have a safe trip and I'll follow along.

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1971 BMW R75 project,
2013 Suzuki DL650A

Hi All,

On 7 Apr 2014, being the last night in Kathmandu we had our dinner at Naglo, which is a well know restaurant. I had Thali chicken set and my Mrs ordered corn bread and dhal. To close the night, we ordered apple pie and hot lemon & ginger with honey. The dinner was just perfect to end our stay in Kathmandu. It was raining when we headed back to our hotel. Probably Kathmandu was crying because we are leaving.

We left Kathmandu early the next day after breakfast, slightly before 8 am. The weather was still chilly. Pokhara is about 211 km away but we were informed that the journey would take about 5 hours because of the roads and traffic condition. Black V seemed excited to be in Kathmandu and it gave no trouble to start everything up in the morning. We stopped at a Castrol station to fill up. Petrol per litre is USD1.47 and I only topped up 10 litres only because I did not want to overweigh Black V.

After topping up petrol, we headed straight to Highway 1 leading to Pokhara. The 'highway' is a 2 lane road, 1 yours and the other one belongs to the on-coming vehicles. but in actual fact in Nepal, your lane also belongs to the other vehicles. Quite frequently, you have to slow down or stop completely because the other vehicles - buses, trucks, mini vans, cars, motorcycles, tractors etc will come into your lane like you don't exist. So to ride safe, you have to take care of your own self because the on-coming vehicles don't bother about you. We rode slowly and sometimes very very slow. The road condition was 50% good, 25% bad and 25% extremely bad. A lot of pot holes, uneven surfaces and also road under repair.
The road winds up and down and around the mountain with the cliff on one side and a ravine on the other. The weather was clear and we caught glimpses of the Annapurna range. Although the road was sometimes dangerous and daunting, the scenery was very beautiful and awesome. I can explain over here by describing them and showing photos but it would not be the same and it is something that you have to experience for yourself. The whole journey took us about 8 hours because we took it slow and easy. No hurry and no rushing, like we said before 'it is not the destination that matters but the journey'.

We arrived in Pokhara at around 5 pm and went to Phewa Lake, a touristy spot just like Phuket. A lot of foreigners around and the place is quite a laid back place. Later we checked into ‘Arrival In Highland’ hotel near the lake with reasonable rates and breakfast included. The hotel owner conducted a small welcoming ceremony to welcome us into their hotel. Black V is parked in a secure place in the hotel compound.
We did a 3 days 2 nights mountain trekking in Pokhara.

Our visa will expire on 16 Apr so we will stay in Phokara till 15 Apr and after that we will proceed to India.

Cheers,
Borneoman & Trailing Spouse on 2 Wheels

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We did a 3 days 2 nights mountain tracking in Pokhara.

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Awesome.......Take care.